[UPDATED mid-story with screenshots from True's original Facebook postings of his recorded results on caucus night, and UPDATED AGAIN at bottom with the affidavit True has filed, and a few additional details from GOP officials and elsewhere on the current status of results. UPDATED YET AGAIN at bottom after we spoke at length with True late this afternoon and after GOP county chair confirms True's numbers.]

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Thanks to the transparent, open counting process at Tuesday's night's Iowa GOP Caucuses, and a Ron Paul supporter who was paying close attention to the results, we may now be learning that Rick Santorum, not Mitt Romney, actually won the "First-in-the-Nation" Iowa Caucuses this week.

According to a report tonight from television station KCCI NewsChannel 8 in Des Moines, Edward True, a supporter of Paul's says he participated in the counting at the Washington Wells caucus in Appanoose County and wrote down the results he witnessed there on a piece of paper which he posted to Facebook that night. Later, in comparing his totals to the precinct results made available on the Iowa GOP website [CSV version here], he noticed that Romney is shown as receiving 22 votes at that precinct, rather than the 2 that True recorded him as receiving that night at the caucus.

If True is correct, and if no other anomalies are discovered in the coming days, it would mean that Santorum will have won the Iowa Caucuses by 12 votes, rather than lost it to Romney by 8, as reported by the GOP in the early morning hours on Wednesday...

According to KCCI:

Edward True, 28, of Moulton, said he helped count the votes and jotted the results down on a piece of paper to post to his Facebook page. He said when he checked to make sure the Republican Party of Iowa got the count right, he said he was shocked to find they hadn't.
...
True said at his 53-person caucus at the Garrett Memorial Library, Romney received two votes. According to the Iowa Republican Party's website, True's precinct cast 22 votes for Romney.

Indeed, according to the Iowa GOP's posted results, out of 13 caucuses in Appanoose County, Romney received double-digits at only one other caucus beside Washington Wells. He is said to have received 20 votes at Vermillion Douglas Sharon, but other than those two sites, Romney received just 45 at the other 11 caucus sites combined...

In KCCI's video report, reporter Amanda Lewis notes that True also points to a discrepancy in the number of voters at his caucus, in addition to one more question that The BRAD BLOG has been able to solve.

Here's their report:

As Lewis explains near the end of her report: "True said that there was one other mistake. The Iowa GOP reports there were a total of 79 votes cast at his caucus, but only 53 people attended that night, he said. He said 20 of the non-existent votes went to Romney, but he has no idea where they counted an additional 6."

Well, we've figured out where those "additional 6" seem to come from. True's hand-written tally [see graphic at right] fails to include former Louisiana Governor Buddy Roemer who, according to the GOP's numbers seen above, received 6 votes at the Washington Wells caucus. Those 6, plus the alleged extra 20 given to Romney, would bring the total number of votes to 79. That still fails to explain the difference, however, between True's assertion of 53 voters, versus the GOP's reported 79.

Also, the 6 votes for Roemer at the one precinct seem odd, as he is reported to have received just 31 votes across the entire state on Tuesday night. Other than the missing Roemer tally and the Romney discrepancy, all of True's numbers appear to match the GOP's.

We've not been able to find True's Facebook page as of yet, so can't confirm that he, in fact, posted those results there that night, but we'll presume for now that KCCI was able to confirm as much prior to their report. (Though why they couldn't find Roemer's 6 votes listed in the Iowa GOP totals --- which they even show in their video report --- is another matter.)

UPDATE: We have been able to find True's Facebook postings. His personal page is here. He posted his results on the night of the caucus at both the Des Moines for Ron Paul 2012 page (on Tuesday at 6:25p PT) and the SE Iowa for Ron Paul 2012 page (on Tuesday at 6:29p PT). Here are screenshots of those posts. NOTE: The timestamp shown on each is Pacific Time because we're in L.A.. Central Time in Iowa is 2 hours late :

"It doesn't matter what you say happened," noted Harris at the time, "only a photo or video matters. Compare this with the state party's report of your local caucus report to make sure it's the same."

True did compare the state party's results to his own, and that's where he says he found the apparent error. Unfortunately, he doesn't appear to have taken a cell phone photo of the caucus results report. (Though we don't know that for certain, as we've yet to make contact with him --- but hope he'll contact us if he reads this article!Update: We've now spoken with True and he did not, unfortunately, get a cell phone photo. More details on that conversation in the 1/6/12, 5:01pm PT UPDATE below.)

Two other quick points for now.

KCCI's Lewis reports: "A spokeswoman with the Iowa Republican Party said True is not a precinct captain and he's not a county chairperson so he has no business talking about election results. She also said the party would not be giving interviews about possible discrepancies until the caucus vote is certified."

If, in fact, Lewis' report there is accurate --- it does not appear to be a direct quote from the unnamed spokesperson in Lewis' written report --- it's extraordinarily offensive. True is owed an apology. He has every "business" in the world "talking about results" of an election that he voted in and even helped to count and oversee, and he ought to be thanked by the Iowa GOP for his careful note-keeping, if he is right, and that he's concerned enough to try and let the world know about the apparent error, even if he isn't.

Lastly, Lewis also interviews "KCCI Political Analyst" Dennis Goldford on camera in her report, who says that while a change in the results wouldn't be the "end of the world", it "will make Iowa look a little foolish in the eyes of the rest of the country."

No, Mr. Lewis, it won't. Or at least it shouldn't. Hopefully it help the rest of the country understand that it is because of the exceptionally transparent election processes that the Iowa GOP allows their voters to enjoy at their own caucuses --- where all are allowed to vote on hand-marked paper ballots which are immediately hand-counted publicly at the caucus site, with results announced before ballots are moved or results are called in to a central headquarters --- which may allow us to know that the announced "winner" on Caucus Night didn't actually win the election!

There will, undoubtedly, be others who were there that night who can confirm either True's numbers or the GOP's. Whichever numbers are ultimately confirmed --- thanks to the transparent processes that the GOP routinely fights against allowing elsewhere, for elections in which non-Republicans will be participating --- we will likely be able to arrive quickly at a conclusive and verifiable consensus as to who really won and who didn't.

That there are so few questions about the results at this point, in an election so incredibly close (Either an 8 or 16 vote margin out of 122,000 votes cast! All tallied transparently in public, by hand, within an hour or two of the end of voting) is a model of Democracy's Gold Standard and should be emulated by the rest of the nation...if only the GOP would allow everyone else in the nation, or even in Iowa, to vote the way they allow their own voters to at the Iowa caucuses.

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UPDATE 1/6/12 12:31pm PT: True has filed a 2-page notarized affidavit [posted below] attesting to his account that Romney received just 2 votes at the Washington Wells precinct where he participated as one of three counters.

He also claims in the affidavit that after noticing the discrepancy in the GOP's reported results, he had "called Tony Siebert who had been nominated at our caucus to be in charge of our local caucus gathering" who read him the results from his own vote tally sheet and "confirmed my numbers, that Romney got 2 votes, not 22 at our local caucus." He also attests that GOP County Chairman, Lyle Brinegar also "confirmed my numbers" in a subsequent phone call.

Again, this is the beauty of a full transparent system of precinct-based hand-counting. Others can confirm election night results independently. As True also writes in his affidavit that after counting at the caucus site, "The vote totals were then read aloud to all present," there are likely to be dozens of others who can confirm the caucus night tallies as well. None of this type of independent confirmation would be possible with computer tallies --- even with paper based optical-scan systems.

Adding to the obnoxious comment described in KCCI's orginal report, attributed to an unnamed "spokeswoman with the Iowa Republican Party" charging that True is "not a precinct captain and he's not a county chairperson so he has no business talking about election results," the Iowa GOP chair, Matt Strawn, has offered a similarly offensive statement, according to a report today by Rachel Rose Hartman at Yahoo News' "The Ticket".

"Out of respect to the candidates involved, party officials will not respond to every rumor, innuendo or allegation during the two week process," Strawn is quoted as having said in his statement to the Des Moines Register.

Dear Iowa GOP, I am a nominated delegate for my Precinct and the true winner from the vote count in my caucus was Santorum with 21 votes. I am not a person in a position controlled by you I am in a position to serve the interests of the people I was nominated by. The 1st Amendment of the Constitution gives me the right to speak up and make sure the numbers are correct and reported honestly.

Good for him. And if the GOP won't thank True for his dilligence, we will. Thank you, Mr. True.

Furthermore, in an updated report posted in a new video at the KCCI webpage, the news outlet reports that "GOP party officials are confident the winner of the Iowa Caucuses will not change."

Anchor Kevin Cooney says he spoke with Strawn, who told him that he was "in contact with Appanoose GOP leaders, and GOP officials are confident the final certified results from Appanoose County will not change the winner of the Iowa Caucuses." Cooney added that he was told the certified results will be available, "in about a week and a half." He also spoke again to True who confirmed that he is "100% certain positive" of his numbers.

Note the careful wording of Strawn's statement, however. He does not say that True is wrong, or that the Appanoose County numbers will not change, only that they "will not change the winner of the Iowa Caucuses."

On Fox News’ On The Record tonight, Santorum said that he spoke with the head of the Iowa Republican Party, who told him that there was a separate counting error that incorrectly stripped 21 votes from Romney. Therefore, the two counting errors, according to Santorum, have largely offset themselves, although the final certification is yet to be completed.

We do not have details on that "separate counting error" Santorum is said to have referred to, though a report by James Q. Lynch of The Gazette notes that: "Late last night, The Gazette received a report of a discrepancy in the vote totals that were reported in the Illyria and Westfield townships in Fayette County. The report could not immediately be verified."

Whether those Fayette County discrepancies are the "offset[ing]" error Santorum refers to remains to be seen, but again, this type of independent verification is only possible thanks to the fact that there were thousands of eyeballs witnessing Tuesday's night's open hand-count tally of the paper ballots in Iowa. Any legitimate reports of mis-reporting of those numbers will be independently verifiable by any number of witnesses at each caucus site, none of which would be possible under a computer-count system where voters are forced to simply "trust" in either computer hardware or software, or in post-election recounts when the chain of custody and authenticity of ballots has already fallen into question.

Also, see New York Times' stats wiz Nathan Silver's report today. Based on a statistical analysis, Silver concludes again that True's report is quite possible accurate, and also notes that, for some reason, there are still some 8 different caucus sites showing no results at all in the GOP's reported numbers. Silver's conclusion: "For now, the caucuses are probably best thought of as still being too close to call."

UPDATE 1/6/12, 5:01pm PT: Just got off the phone with Edward True. I have absolutely no doubt that his story is accurate, and that Romney received 2, not 22 votes at his precinct. Furthermore, he tells me there "There was no votes for Roemer" at his site. So wherever those 6 votes came from, he cannot say. He does add that there were actually 54, not 53 votes at his site, but that "one of them had a name that nobody could understand, or it was something off the wall," so he hadn't included that in his 53 vote tally sheet. He's also been kicking himself that he didn't take a cell phone photo of the tally sheet, though believes one will come forward soon. In the meantime, he was also very happy to see that Appanoose GOP County Chair Lyle Brinegar has confirmed to the Des Moines Register that he, not the GOP, had the correct numbers.

Watch this razor-edge outcome, if it's Romney +8 or Santarum +12, get cited by vote-blocking advocates to justify imposing voter photo ID everywhere to prevent so-called, but fictional, voter impersonators at precincts. The so-called impersonators, they like to say, will "cancel" out other votes.

But look what Iowa shows. With no requirement Tuesday for a state-issued ID, no disqualifying of young college voters, and even allowing same-day registrants to vote at caucuses --- we can wonder how the vote count would tip if any of those Iowa voters were refused or cancelled for IDs without expiration dates, or an ID college issued, or not from DMV? (Note 22 counties in Tennessee have no DMV bureau, but Tennessee wants to demand such ID for all voters for president. Same issues across many states.)

Non-existent double voting at precincts doesn't cancel out votes. Cancelling a voter's participation erases votes. Photo ID doesn't get to where real fraud has always existed, and perpetrated by either party, Republican and Democratic, --- in absentee mail-in ballots. That's why the intent of photo ID is revealed. Photo ID is not used to protect legitimate voters, it's to cancel some important number of them.

Elections can be close, as Iowa shows. Keeping a voter from casting a vote to count same day at a precinct cancels numbers of votes. Some elections, it tips the balance.

The IOWA caucus counting and transparency may be better than average, but recounts and audits are also necessary components of election integrity. It is one thing to count accurately, add, and transcribe the few votes in the single race by people at the caucus for a couple of hours - yet even here they can easily make errors of miss intentional fraud. In an election with thousands of votes in a polling place, with many races on the ballot, with election officials working 17 hour days errors and missing fraud can be expected whether votes are counted by hand or machine the risk of errors in counting, addition, and transcription are great - the pressure/desire to leave strong.

FYI, while the media attention is on who "won" Iowa, a reminder that it's not winner take all. Candidates only get delegates for the precincts they won.

But what Iowa and NH are really about is managing the expectations game. Romney had to win Iowa to avoid being dubbed "the 25% guy" and to build a drumbeat for inevitability so the can push the other candidates out of the race.

Excellent note that the number of voters was less than the number of votes, which corroborates that it was in error. Excellent to see that the Ron Paul supporters listened to advice to capture evidence. And isn't it interesting to see how that reportedly annoyed the party hacks?

By the way, the core of the story here is not that there are errors or there is fraud. It's that the Iowa process was, unlike most elections, actually transparent, giving public citizens back controls to catch error or fraud. In New Hampshire, though I'll be writing up tips for catching it there, it is not transparent.

Note the quote from the party hack, that it wasn't his business to capture the result or talk about it? That's the current fight in election transparency. We need to take concealment of the process away from party hacks, and let the public see (and expose) any errors or fraud.

Some people get lost in the weeds, thinking that because errors or fraud were caught, it casts a bad light on the mechanism used. In fact, it's exactly the opposite.

Watching the returns on Tuesday night, they kept coming in at a steady pace. When everything ground to a halt at 98%, I knew that someone somewhere was waiting to plug a total to make Romney the winner. I went to bed with Santorum up by 6, knowing I would wake up to find Romney ahead - I was not surprised the next morning.

I will predict at this point that any election reconciliation will be put on a slow track so that the count will not be officially changed until April or later. By then, it's political impact will already have been spent and the finish will be moot. But any correction will be a partial victory for election integrity.

That there are so few questions about the results at this point, in an election so incredibly close (Either an 8 or 16 vote margin out of 122,000 votes cast! All tallied transparently in public, by hand, within an hour or two of the end of voting) is a model of Democracy's Gold Standard and should be emulated by the rest of the nation..

Perhaps this would truly be a Gold Standard if they had any provisions for conducting a recount. As it is, we'll just have to take their word for it.

Regarding conducting a recount: In situations like this, you can be assured that any recount will match the stated result. As soon as ballots leave the precinct, chain of custody breaks and you have no idea whether you are counting the real ballots or substitutes.

Exactly... the IOWA process gets close to the "Gold Standard", but doesn't quite hit the mark. No provisions for a recount, and subsequently no appropriate precautions to maintain the integrity of the ballots.

Keep the up good work, BTW. You and Brad are the "Gold Standard" for voting integrity investigations.

Perhaps this would truly be a Gold Standard if they had any provisions for conducting a recount. As it is, we'll just have to take their word for it.

Not really. The beauty here is that there are MULTIPLE eye-witnesses and contemporaneous corroborating evidence at each and ever caucus site. As you likely know, recounts are already questionable as, by then, ballots have disappeared into darkness and their chain of custody is in question.

The most reliable count is the initial count when EVERYONE IS ALLOWED TO WATCH, as happened here. It's far more reliable to count on dozens of independent witnesses as to what the original count was. We have that here.

Even if there were provisions for a recount and chain of custody for ballots, etc., the process still can be questioned. That's in contrast to a fully public, fully transparent election night count, witnessed by dozens of folks who can independently and separately verify what the original count was!

Windy - Nobody's mentioning that, because it wouldn't be true The only swap that would occur with the number's True reports would be that Santorum would be in first by 12 votes, followed by Romney, followed by Paul several thousands votes behind the two front runners.

Full disclosure: I'm supporting Ron Paul, so I am one of those "supporters of the reported 'loser'" that is going away "believing they've been robbed" (even though Paul did respectable third). And, generally, I'm struggling (really) to not fall into conspiracy theory explanations of Paul's third place finish.

That said, I would be very appreciative if someone could address/explain what seem to be very strange coincidences/anomalies in this caucus:

1. In the first fifteen or twenty minutes of MSM coverage, all channels had Paul up some significant amount (supposedly based on the entrance/exit polling). If I recall correctly, it was something like Paul: 43%, with Santorum in 2nd and Romney in 3rd.

The MSM explanation for this, best I can tell, is that, in an open caucus, such as in Iowa, people can change their minds, after reporting their intended vote on entrance.

This made some sense to me, until I watched a few caucus examples on C-Span. It really didn't strike me as the sort of environment where all that many people were going to be swayed to change their votes, based on the speaches being given.

Also (and forgive me if this is a "Paulbot" assumption), I would have thought that if you could count on anything... it would be that people stating an intention to vote for Paul weren't going to be swayed (especially to Romney or Santorum). Granted, I can't comprehend the idea that 30-40% were claiming to be "undecided" either.

Either way, is anyone actually familiar enough with caucus dynamics, historically,to make me feel less suspicious of this claim? Is it really possible that 21% of voters were swayed between entrance and exit?

I saw one channel state that the reason that there was such a huge difference between the initial entrance polls (43%) and the ultimate result (21%) was that Ron Paul's people were more inclined to "show up early" and that this, somehow skewed the entrance polling data?

Does anyone find this logical or reasonable, historically?

2) What happened to the bump Paul was (logically/anecdotally)from the "college" counties?

When my hope was waning that Paul would do 1st or 2nd, John King on CNN, single handedly gave me some glimmer of hope, based on his constant analysis that these counties were both larger and more likely to swing Paul's way because they were in "college counties." And, for most of the night, these counties remained blank on his screen (uncounted?).

Since I could not stay up till 1AM, I went to bed with these counties still undecided ( I think).

Now, I'm hearing rumors that "the truck that got lost" (whatever the hell that means) was, specifically holding ballots for one (or several) of these "college counties."

Is this true?

Did they find the truck?

Is this the situation where, supposedly, Romney and Santorum's team had a "gentleman's agreement" about the results (while the truck was still driving aimlessly through the back roads of Iowa, per Karl Rove)?

If this is the case, is it normal/legal for

a) Romney and Santorum's teams to have a "gentleman's agreement" about the results?
b) Why would Karl Rove know the results before anyone else?

Now, I'm trying (really hard, honest) to not be conspiratorial. But, ALL of the explanations (Jim Condit,etc.) I've read about how Iowa's caucus system has (in the past) been rigged have to do with the difference between what happens in the voting rooms/totals and what get's "called into" HQ.

3) What's up with that GOP official, (Dee Dee something) giving an interview several days before the caucus to Breitbart's site in which she blatantly bragged that "the GOP would not let Paul win. Period."?

Am I missing something... or even if they were that corrupt... wouldn't she still have been chastised or fired (or something)? Wouldn't the GOP be (slightly) concerned about "keeping up appearances" at least?

This site, IMHO, is critically important because if things keep going like this, I am going to lose all faith in our electoral process.

I am fine with winning/losing the hearts/minds of the voters and a fair vote/election.

I think I'll truly be despondent if I start to believe that not only are our elections a sham... but the criminals doing the "shamming" are so confident that they are willing to brag about their criminality PUBLICLY, with no shame.

It sends shivers down my spine to think that we may ALREADY live in a country where there isn't even the need to "fake" like we have honest elections.

I would be very appreciative if someone could address/explain what seem to be very strange coincidences/anomalies in this caucus:

I'll be happy to try...

1. In the first fifteen or twenty minutes of MSM coverage, all channels had Paul up some significant amount (supposedly based on the entrance/exit polling). If I recall correctly, it was something like Paul: 43%, with Santorum in 2nd and Romney in 3rd.

"If I recall correctly" won't do it. Got cite? Cuz that's a mighty big presumption to work on here.

I saw one channel state that the reason that there was such a huge difference between the initial entrance polls (43%) and the ultimate result (21%) was that Ron Paul's people were more inclined to "show up early" and that this, somehow skewed the entrance polling data?

Does anyone find this logical or reasonable, historically?

Without having seen the polling you refer to, let's stipulate, for now, that your characterization is correct. (And please realize, that's a huge stipulation until I can actually verify what it is you're referring to).

There can be all kinds of explanations for what you saw. The first one that occurs to me --- and, again, it's based on the unsupported assertion that your numbers explained above are accurate --- is that Paul's supporters are, in fact, highly motivated, and may have been eager to seek out Entrance Pollers and share their strong feelings with them, versus supporters of the other candidates who, as you may have noticed, have MUCH weaker feelings about the candidates they ended up supporting. Thus, they didn't go out of their way to tell pollsters about it. Additionally, if there was a huge number of "undecideds" on the way in (and, as I recall, there was) those could also lead to a big change in the actual results.

2) What happened to the bump Paul was (logically/anecdotally)from the "college" counties?

Don't know. What happened to them? Have you looked at the GOP's results [PDF] for those areas? Did they, in fact, go for Paul? And, if so, were there enough of them to sway an entire state?

Now, I'm hearing rumors that "the truck that got lost" (whatever the hell that means) was, specifically holding ballots for one (or several) of these "college counties."

Is this true?

To my understanding (this is one of several reports I've been tracking down this week), there was no truck. That was based on an inaccurate report by AP, according to New Yorker: "an A.P. report that the remaining votes were in the back of a truck somewhere turned out to be inaccurate".

That makes sense, of course, since all votes were counted AT THE CAUCUS SITES publicly. There would have been no truck transporting any ballots (unless it was after they had already been counted publicly and were then being transported to some central location for storage or something.)

Is this the situation where, supposedly, Romney and Santorum's team had a "gentleman's agreement" about the results (while the truck was still driving aimlessly through the back roads of Iowa, per Karl Rove)?

The report you refer to is also inaccurate. It likely comes from this video in which Rove discusses not a "gentleman's agreement" about anything, but rather Romney and Santorum's caucus reps both agreeing on the results of one caucus site (Ward 2, Precinct 2 in Clinton County) where the totals for that site seem to have been missing from the GOP's central repository.

Shortly after the video you see above, CNN found the GOP Chairwoman of Clinton County sleeping at home and awoken by their phone call. They asked her what the results were for Clinton County 2-2 and she checked her results sheet right then and there and gave CNN the same numbers that the Romney and Santorum reps had both had (the ones they had agreed were correct). So now there were three different independent sources all agreeing on those missing numbers.

Once again, that's the beauty of the publicly transparent counting at the polling place. There are dozens of folks who can all independently corroborate the actual count, as the three folks mentioned above did here.

Now, I'm trying (really hard, honest) to not be conspiratorial. But, ALL of the explanations (Jim Condit,etc.) I've read about how Iowa's caucus system has (in the past) been rigged have to do with the difference between what happens in the voting rooms/totals and what get's "called into" HQ.

I can't speak to how it has happened in the past, but on Tuesday, all of the counting was done openly (or, was supposed to have been, and I haven't heard any reports to the contrary). If there were any differences between the results tallied at the caucus site and those reported by the GOP, folks can and should make noise about it. Just as Edward True did.

As I know there was a big effort, particularly by Paul's folks, to get people to independently record results from each caucus site, any remaining disparities should already be known, or should be made public very soon. To date, I have heard of only one or two other such sites, though I've seen no documentary evidence to prove it yet (as we have in the Edward True case.)

If Paul's folks have evidence the system was gamed, where is it? If they haven't produced any, I'm guessing it didn't happen, because they were at every caucus site and the public count allows them to show any disparities NOW. But they haven't, to date.

Sure. But it's a pretty risky thing to do when you know you've just openly counted at each site and announced the results at each of them. If the GOP gamed it, why has nobody but True so far spoken up?

3) What's up with that GOP official, (Dee Dee something) giving an interview several days before the caucus to Breitbart's site in which she blatantly bragged that "the GOP would not let Paul win. Period."?

Didn't see it. Don't know who she is. And, of course, anybody can say anything.

This site, IMHO, is critically important because if things keep going like this, I am going to lose all faith in our electoral process.

I see no reason for "faith" in anything when it comes to the electoral process. I see every reason for demanding evidence, however. And, in the case of the GOP Iowa Caucuses, from everything I've been able to see, evidence is publicly available to thousands of folks for the reported totals and for any disparity in those totals. Unlike most elections (where secret vote counting is used with DRE/Touch-screens or optical-scan systems.)

Hope those responses help. And hopefully I've got enough credibility when it comes to calling out unverifiable elections that you can rest somewhat assured I have no interest in covering for anybody in such a case as this.

I have a few more anecdotal reports I'm still trying to track down --- and, as I've noted here many times, sometimes evidence of probs emerges days or even weeks/months later --- but as of now, I've found no reason to doubt the overall numbers from the Tuesday GOP caucuses in Iowa.

Initially, I thought I was most concerned about electing RP. Now, I'm more interested in (okay... equally interested in) doing something about the electoral process.

Watching the debate in NH last night and listening to Santorum spout off about how Obama didn't "do something" about Iran's "obviously bogus" election results made me sad and angry. It made me realize that I no longer actually believe that our country has an honest election/democratic process and that I can't (with confidence) feel ANY sense of comfort/pride in our country being more open/democratic/free than any of the most banana of republics. Ugh.

Thank you, sincerely, for taking the time to reply to my comment. You helped a fellow citizen to better understand what he needs to do.

That said, a few more questions...

"If I recall correctly" won't do it. Got cite? Cuz that's a mighty big presumption to work on here."

Ok. Lesson learned. Apparently, I need to actually do some work myself instead of expect others to do it for me. I searched far and wide and couldn't find any corroboration to my recollection. So, I'll simply give my personal ancedotal evidence, not in an effort to prove anything, but just to ask you another question...

I was running through my house shouting for my wife to "Please come look at the television screen... because I'm pretty sure this is the last time you're ever going to see this happen! Ron Paul is kicking ass! He's at 43%!!!" I then flipped back and forth between CNN's and MSNBC's chiron numbers to show her.

In future, I'll take the time to snap a pick with my phone.

And, as I better recall these moments, I now remember that it wasn't actually the exit/entrance polling nubers ; it was the actual vote resutls. Because, as I remember my silliness of running through the house searching for my wife, I now remember that this was about the fact that it was "the real" vote counts, albeit with only approximately 1% of "the real" votes in.

My ancedotal evidence (I believe) is further reinforced by the fact that (at least on CNN and MSNBC, which I was flipping back and forth between all night) during these glorious (for me) few moments, the talking heads on both channels seemed to be spending most of their initial commentary explaining Paul's huge lead and how the GOP was now going to be forced to consider some of his positions... blah blah blah.

Nonetheless, even if I was correct, it seems a moot point. If (and, of course, it's a big "if") I was correct, I'd just like some perspective on whether it would matter?

I'm assuming the rational/logical/historical response will be, "Of course any candidate could be at any number with only 1% of the vote in."

Do you think it's this simple?

Would you, with your experience, see NOTHING in a candidate having such a strong intial lead (even with only 1% in) and things changing so dramatically, ultimately?

My search for a video or screen capture of this early (1-5% results in) reporting continues, but I'm primarily interested in your gut feeling about whether this sort of dramatic shift in ranking (assuming it did actually happen)would make YOU suspicious,at all?

"There can be all kinds of explanations for what you saw. The first one that occurs to me is that Paul's supporters are, in fact, highly motivated, and may have been eager to seek out Entrance Pollers and share their strong feelings with them, versus supporters of the other candidates who, as you may have noticed, have MUCH weaker feelings about the candidates they ended up supporting. Thus, they didn't go out of their way to tell pollsters about it. Additionally, if there was a huge number of "undecideds" on the way in (and, as I recall, there was) those could also lead to a big change in the actual results."

I think your reasoning here is very logical. Based solely on arguments with my 73-year-old father, who has pledged to "Hold his nose and vote for anyone the GOP jams down our throats (EXCEPT RON PAUL)," I have to imagine that many of the Romney voters weren't killing themselves to talk to pollsters.

Although, I really don't get the whole "undecided" thing. Is this real? Do people (over 30%!!!) of citizens actually bother to get off their butts and drive to a polling place (let alone a caucus type arrangement) and have no real opinion until they are putting pen to ballot? I guess I was assuming that this "undecided" categorization was some sort of MSM urban legend or something.

"Don't know. What happened to them? Have you looked at the GOP's results [PDF] for those areas? Did they, in fact, go for Paul? And, if so, were there enough of them to sway an entire state?"

I sorted and dissected the results a little for the counties that were mentioned in most of the "conspiracy" theories I've heard (more on this later) and, was surprised (actually) at how they seemed to line up (pretty darn close) to the MSM reporting of the numbers and the major polls leading into the caucus. They seemed to show a very strong showing (usually a close 2nd) for Paul, with around 24% of the vote... but, considering they are just a small piece of the total results don't "scream" anything nefarious to me. When I scrub my emotions/memories of that 43% number (the 1-5% early voting results), it appears that the actual results don't seem very surprising or different from polls coming into Iowa. So, so far, so good on making me (slightly) less despondent.

"To my understanding (this is one of several reports I've been tracking down this week), there was no truck. That was based on an inaccurate report by AP, according to New Yorker: "an A.P. report that the remaining votes were in the back of a truck somewhere turned out to be inaccurate. That makes sense, of course, since all votes were counted AT THE CAUCUS SITES publicly. There would have been no truck transporting any ballots (unless it was after they had already been counted publicly and were then being transported to some central location for storage or something."

Right. Okay. But...

The reason I gave ANY credence to the conspiratorial views was that there (seemed) to be some weird (and convenient to the GOP's probably desired memes coming out of Iowa):

So, instead of guessing or adding to conspiracy theories, I'd like to get your feedback on a few things:

1) What do you think of what this GOP operative, Dee Dee Benkie, says a few days before the caucus, in an interview one of Breitbart's sites?

As I listened and re-listened to this interview, I imagine that a non-conspiracy view of what she is saying is that the GOP will be "twisting arms," politically to sway votes one way or another... hard ball politics, maybe, but not actual fraud. Although, especially, initially, and (honestly) still now, I don't think you'd have to be crazy to interpret what she's saying as "The GOP will fix the results, NO MATTER WHAT." I'd love to know what you think about what she says.

"The report you refer to is also inaccurate. It likely comes from this video in which Rove discusses not a "gentleman's agreement" about anything, but rather Romney and Santorum's caucus reps both agreeing on the results of one caucus site (Ward 2, Precinct 2 in Clinton County) where the totals for that site seem to have been missing from the GOP's central repository. Shortly after the video you see above, CNN found the GOP Chairwoman of Clinton County sleeping at home and awoken by their phone call. They asked her what the results were for Clinton County 2-2 and she checked her results sheet right then and there and gave CNN the same numbers that the Romney and Santorum reps had both had (the ones they had agreed were correct). So now there were three different independent sources all agreeing on those missing numbers."

Right. I think we're on the same page (referencing the same video, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD09uVFQs9M). But, it does still seem to appear that there is some discrepancy in the stories being told about this situation.

On NPR, The Clinton County chairwoman says that the results had already been reported to HQ...

About 200 miles from Des Moines, the Republican chair of Clinton County was fast asleep as state officials waited for the final votes in the caucuses. As it turns out, the final votes were needed from the second ward, second precinct, the 2-2 in Clinton County.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

With Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney in a dead heat, the votes were crucial from that precinct. So before midnight, the Romney campaign picked up the phone and called Edith Pfeffer to get those numbers. Republican leaders in Des Moines did not have those results, apparently because of some computer trouble.

WERTHEIMER: We reached the chairwoman of the Clinton County Republican Party to hear her tell the story, and her friend Carolyn Tallet was with her. Tallet is president of the Clinton County Republican Women's Club. She starts us off by explaining they knew it would be a tight race, but had no idea they'd end up at the center of the story.

CAROLYN TALLET: I knew it was close, because I was sitting, watching CNN, waiting to find out the results. I kept wishing, gosh, I wish we would get those last precincts in. But they didn't announce, you know, who was holding up the count. It was just that they weren't all in yet.

EDITH PFEFFER: I had received a phone call - this is Edith. I had received a phone call about 11:20 from the Romney worker who had been working in our county. And he said he needed the count. And I said, well, why do you need the count for 2-2? And he said, well, they don't have it in Des Moines. And I said, but I know they were called in. And he said, well, I think that there was a computer glitch, that the computers went down. And I said, oh, OK. And so I gave him the requested numbers."

So, of course (if you aren't inclined to be looking for fraud and conspiracies), I guess you could accept that "mistakes happen." But, I'm curious if you find NOTHING to peak your interest in the fact that a supposedly "open process" in which everything is handled, mostly, by paper ballots and public vote tallies, in the end, is decided AFTER THE FACT (somewhere between being called into GOP HQ and "certifying results") and is prone to being affected by "computer glitches?"

If the process is...

Votes on paper ballots.
Public tallies called into HQ.
Final "Certified results" from HQ

"I can't speak to how it has happened in the past, but on Tuesday, all of the counting was done openly (or, was supposed to have been, and I haven't heard any reports to the contrary). If there were any differences between the results tallied at the caucus site and those reported by the GOP, folks can and should make noise about it. Just as Edward True did"

In this video, Jim Condit Jr. warns (IN ADVANCE) that there will probably be, based on his past history with the Iowa GOP and work he did for Pat Buchanan, in 1996, that any "computer glitches" or "final results going super late into the night/morning" should be perceived as "fishy."

"We are raising the possibility of the Iowa GOP HQ PRETENDING that their central computer has "been hacked" or has "broken down" --- and that they can't get the results until tomorrow morning." (This is what they did to us in Cincinnati when we were making a serious challenge to take over the Republican Party of Hamilton County in 1990 --- so it's one of the Vote Fraud Syndicate's stock-in-trade TRICKS when they are desperate to rig an election, if they need to.)

Be very suspicious if there is such a "here are the results" announcement tonight (Jan 3, 2012) before or shortly after the Iowa Caucus 2012 starts at 7 PM CST.

In 1996 --- they said Bob Dole would "win 26% to 23%" over Pat Buchanan (in 2nd place, by their before-the-caucus-started report). THAT'S EXACTLY THE WAY IT CAME OUT, according to the Iowa State GOP HQ and the 5 Big TV Networks. That year, one county, Dubuque County, was being watched for votefraud. We proved that the Iowa GOP with Voter News Service in NYC STOLE 13% of Buchanan's vote in Dubuque. (google, A House without Doors", or see our other YouTube video, Watch The Vote 2012 - Iowa Caucus. With no one watching the vote count in the other 98 counties, it is reasonable to assume that Voter News Service (owned by the 5 Big TV Networks and AP wire), where the Iowa GOP County Chairman were told to call in the results, just changed the numbers in each county around until they came up with the numbers they announced BEFORE the Iowa Caucus 1996 even started, --- namely "26% for Dole and 23%" for Buchanan". They claimed they got the numbers to call the Iowa Caucus 1996 IN ADVANCE from "entrance polls." These polls are totally bogus and are there for show at a VERY FEW PLACES in Iowa. (Same goes for "exit polls" in the general election nationwide.)"

Now, aside from, of course, the partisan stuff about Ron Paul, do you find his statements to have any credence?

Do you find that his "warning" told us anything?

I'm asking, mostly, because my head is going to explode from trying to understand this process and winnow the BS from the realities.

"As I know there was a big effort, particularly by Paul's folks, to get people to independently record results from each caucus site, any remaining disparities should already be known, or should be made public very soon. To date, I have heard of only one or two other such sites, though I've seen no documentary evidence to prove it yet (as we have in the Edward True case.)"

A) This, so far, has only provided me with more frustration. I signed up for transparentvote.net to volunteer to document for Pennsylvania and, when I did, seemed to discover that only 13 people from Iowa were members (out of 1700+ sites?). So, either I'm missing something or that site's not doing much.

On their site, they say this, though:

"IOWA- Iowa has 1,784 precincts. We will need 1,784 or more volunteer news reporters, at least one at each precinct, armed with a digital camera or camera phone that will photo and upload the official results from that precinct to Transparentvote.net.

Four years ago, Liberty News Network, which no longer exits, attempted this. Although, they only had a few hundred volunteers participating in Jan. 2008 Iowa caucus, it shook the monopolistic Establishment Media to it’s core!

The problem is News Election Pool is where ALL the MSM get their results. They had never had ANY competition before in reporting the election results. For example, leading up to Caucus night, all these false polls had one particular candidate at 3%. When the precincts started reporting and posting to Liberty News Network, the MSM were reporting the same numbers as Liberty News Network ! This candidate was getting between 12-14% It kept them honest! . We believe the MSM eventually saw they did not have all the precincts covered and after a few hours, this particular candidate’s numbers started to drop, but he still finished with 10% instead of 3% ! This year we need 1,750 volunteers to cover ALL of the precincts, officially documenting (with photo) and uploading the total results, precinct by precinct, transparent for everyone to see."

All well and good... if we can get more than 13 people out of 1700+ sites to bring their damn cell phones and snap a picture of tallies.

B) Why the hell do we need citizens to take cell phone pictures to verify votes? Is it crazy to think that the GOP might actually bring a freaking camera to each caucus and take a picture of the tallies? If they aren't... isn't this some sort of implicit desire to continue "wiggle room" when need be?

"If Paul's folks have evidence the system was gamed, where is it? If they haven't produced any, I'm guessing it didn't happen, because they were at every caucus site and the public count allows them to show any disparities NOW. But they haven't, to date."

And, unfortunately (for wishful Paulbots like me), the tally picture and the results in the PDF you linked to line up EXACTLY. So, I've seen no real evidence yet either.

"Sure. But it's a pretty risky thing to do when you know you've just openly counted at each site and announced the results at each of them. If the GOP gamed it, why has nobody but True so far spoken up?"

Point taken. Which leads me to one last question (and one last chance to be depressed)...

According to you and most of the other "accountability" advocates that I've read, the weapon of choice for "keeping them honest" seems to be documenting the results of caucus type situations.

But, these are the vast minority of voting situations are they not?

Aren't the majority of the votes cast in the primary and general elections going to be done on some sort of black box/computer voting machine?

What "weapon" is there in these situations?

Given your experience, I'm sure you are more familiar with the whole computer/black box voting problem. So, why (if you are) are you optimistic that we can, in any real way, force accountability?

That's precisely what happened in the 2010 Pennsylvania Senate race. Joe Sestak was ahead all evening. There was a pause in the updating of the results. The final result was then announced, with Pat Toomey the winner.

Robert - That was a *really* long comment/question, but I wanted to give you a proper answer. Just wasn't able to get the time to do it today. Please allow me to take another crack at it tomorrow, if I can get some time to do so. Not ignoring you, but there is much to speak to in your long note, and I just couldn't get to it today, unfortunately.

I'm sure you understand how this subject has now become something that I'm deeply worried/concerned/passionate (and a little glimmer of hopeful?) about.

As I stated, upfront, I am noticing "political"/election issues because I am tracking my preferred candidate (Ron Paul), but, as things go on, I am starting to feel as if "the cause before the cause" may be working WITH ALL camps of other "persuasions," TOGETHER, to ensure that any of our democratic (small d) efforts are not completely futile pipe dreams.

If we, as supporters, and our candidates aren't capable, "fair and square," of persuading the electorate to our views, so be it.

But, if, in reality, we really are in a place in our history/nation where only the pre-determined candidates of the 1%, corporate oligarchy/MSM have ANY chance of actually winning... how sad.

Forgive me for quoting RP, please (I'm NOT doing it in a partisan way), but Dr. Paul says that "Liberty and freedom bring people together" and I am starting to believe that, although it may be too early (hope not) for this to lead to RP winning anything substantial this year, I am starting to get hopeful (MAINLY through THIS blog and reading the blogs/comments of those candidates OPPOSING RP --- the ones that AREN'T part of the "pre-approved 1% oligarchy") that the desire for true liberty and freedom are RISING... not waning.

I agree with Matt Taib when he says:

"Now that is real politics --- real protest, real change. Exactly the opposite of the limp and sterile charade in Iowa. This caucus, let’s face it, marks the beginning of a long, rigidly-controlled, carefully choreographed process that is really designed to do two things: weed out dangerous minority opinions, and award power to the candidate who least offends the public while he goes about his primary job of energetically representing establishment interests.

If that sounds like a glib take on a free election system that allows the public to choose whichever candidate it likes best without any censorship or overt state interference, so be it.

But the ugly reality, as Dylan Ratigan continually points out, is that the candidate who raises the most money wins an astonishing 94% of the time in America.

That damning statistic just confirms what everyone who spends any time on the campaign trail knows, which is that the presidential race is not at all about ideas, but entirely about raising money.

The auctioned election process is designed to reduce the field to two candidates who will each receive hundreds of millions of dollars apiece from the same pool of donors. Just take a look at the lists of top donors for Obama and McCain from the last election in 2008.

"The reason 2012 feels so empty now is that voters on both sides of the aisle are not just tired of this state of affairs, they are disgusted by it. They want a chance to choose their own leaders and they want full control over policy, not just a partial say. There are a few challenges to this state of affairs within the electoral process – as much as I disagree with Paul about many things, I do think his campaign is a real outlet for these complaints – but everyone knows that in the end, once the primaries are finished, we’re going to be left with one 1%-approved stooge taking on another."

For the record, I was a neocon-patsy/Bush supporting/Reagan is the candidate of Jesus (or maybe Jesus) BIG R Republican for 40+ years of my life, so if those of you (even those hoping Ron Paul would shut up) want a glimmer of hope that "all is not lost" and that others can be woken up to the oligarchy, take heart. I just endorsed Matt Tiabb and Dylan Ratigan and I (NOW) am willing to listen to ANYONE (supporting ANY candidate) that is willing to help me to fix this electoral nightmare and move things in the direction of FREEDOM.

Again, not referencing RP for partisan purposes, but...

Look at his list of donors/financial supporters at opensecrets.org.

He is, as best I can tell, 99% funded by "THE PEOPLE."

This might give RP a slightly better chance in 2012, but it should give ALL lovers of freedom/liberty/the democratic process some hope (even if you hate RP). Maybe (just maybe) "the people" can have a say. Maybe YOUR candidate, if he can persuade his supporters do donate enough, might actually have a chance (versus the current Disnyesque 1% buys the election farce Tiabb explains).

So, to say what I could have said in 10 words... in 10000... "NO, THANK YOU, BRAD, for fighting the battles that MATTER... helping to create a groundswell for 'the cause before the cause' that everyone BUT the 1% 'status quo' can support."

But, after the last (long) rant about the desire for the ability of "the people" to choose our candidates, I felt this video to be relevant...

The latter part of the video is an appeal for RP, so feel free to ignore that part. But, listen to what one of our ELECTED officials feels emboldened to SAY PUBLICLY (someone behind him says, "You realize we're on live tv, right?):

An elected representative actually didn't feel the need to fake his support of the "status quo" candidate enough to do more than "blah blah blah?"

Are the desires of the people really that much of a joke?

Although, there's a tiny part of me that thinks (maybe) there's a silver lining in this.

Maybe the worst offenders of the "who cares what the people want" memes are too old and clueless to truly understand that things have changed.

Maybe... this sort of offensive "we'll tell you who to elect" BS has been going on for a long time but there wasn't any YT to expose them.

But, of course that silver lining has to be offset by the fact that the current 1% candidate (Obama) and the former GOP 1% candidate (McCain) are "okay " with the proposed SOPA bill which would probably make such exposure's impossible, ultimately.

That damn Internet's a real bitch... maybe we should give the GOV the ability to shut down any sites we deem to not be towing the 1%/Government line?

Obama's okay with it.

Many legislators of both parties have supported it.

NONE (other than RP) of the current crop of GOP contenders has even mentioned it.

My guess... Bradblog.com would be high on the list of potential enemies.

Please slow down! Give me a chance to respond before piling on again, if you don't mind!

Okay, will try to catch up with at least your key questions in the 3 or so comments you've left that I haven't been able to comment to. If I missed a specific point, for brevity, feel free to re-ask. It's not on purpose. Okay, your first long reply...

Re: Your recollection of Paul having 43%:

I now remember that it wasn't actually the exit/entrance polling nubers ; it was the actual vote resutls. Because, as I remember my silliness of running through the house searching for my wife, I now remember that this was about the fact that it was "the real" vote counts, albeit with only approximately 1% of "the real" votes in.
...
If (and, of course, it's a big "if") I was correct, I'd just like some perspective on whether it would matter?

I'm assuming the rational/logical/historical response will be, "Of course any candidate could be at any number with only 1% of the vote in."

Do you think it's this simple?

Pretty much, yes. With 1% of the returns in, it tells us pretty much nothing, other than how Paul (or anyone else) did in one of those very few precincts reporting. If talking heads on TV made more out of it than they should have --- well, that's what those idiots do while trying to fill Election Night coverage with a bunch of words and "intelligent sounding analysis".

Would you, with your experience, see NOTHING in a candidate having such a strong intial lead (even with only 1% in) and things changing so dramatically, ultimately?

I would not see anything in that. Not with only 1% reported.

My search for a video or screen capture of this early (1-5% results in) reporting continues, but I'm primarily interested in your gut feeling about whether this sort of dramatic shift in ranking (assuming it did actually happen)would make YOU suspicious,at all?

It would not. That happens all the time that early in the reported results of any one contest. Plus, my "gut" (and yours) is meaningless. What matters is what we can see (or not see).

I really don't get the whole "undecided" thing. Is this real? Do people (over 30%!!!) of citizens actually bother to get off their butts and drive to a polling place (let alone a caucus type arrangement) and have no real opinion until they are putting pen to ballot? I guess I was assuming that this "undecided" categorization was some sort of MSM urban legend or something.

Sure it's real. Especially in a year like this one when the "far and away front-runner" has changed just about once a week over the past several months, with the "front-runner" way out ahead of the pack and then suddenly collapsing to nothing once people actually get to hear from them.

With this pack, yes, a high undecided makes perfect sense. And yes, with the sense of civic pride for the "First-in-the-Nation" caucuses in Iowa, it makes perfect sense for folks to show up to the caucuses, do their duty, and see who's reps might convince them to come aboard and vote for them.

"Don't know. What happened to them? Have you looked at the GOP's results [PDF] for those areas? Did they, in fact, go for Paul? And, if so, were there enough of them to sway an entire state?"

I sorted and dissected the results a little for the counties that were mentioned in most of the "conspiracy" theories I've heard (more on this later) and, was surprised (actually) at how they seemed to line up (pretty darn close) to the MSM reporting of the numbers and the major polls leading into the caucus.

Which is why it's always best to go as close to the source as you can, rather than relying on the "analysis" of partisans for things like this. Glad you looked for yourself, and find things aren't as out of whack as you initially thought they were.

1) What do you think of what this GOP operative, Dee Dee Benkie, says a few days before the caucus, in an interview one of Breitbart's sites?

I think that interview, the way it's posted, is, in itself a fraud! You'll note about 2 mins in, they add a graphic that says "Republican Strategist: 'Ron Paul Won't be Allowed to Win'". But listen to what was said, she didn't say anything of the sort!

She said the party establishment doesn't want Paul to win, that local officials may try to get voters to vote against Paul (either for Romney or Santorum) etc. Will they "twist arms" to try and get voters to vote as they like? Sure. Paul supporters can try to do that as well. Does the local party have a lot of power to "deliver the vote"? Sure. But that's power politics. Not fraud.

Finally, it doesn't matter what any analyst says, or even what the party machines wants. Not in a transparent system of voting and vote counting in any case. That's the whole point! And that's why it's great the way they do it in Iowa! Anywhere else in the nation, for the most part, they can pull the secret strings and change the results and there's little chance of that being discovered (or being provable, even if it is discovered). But, in Iowa, everything is transparent! Yay! So even if they try to game it (and one should always presume bad guys want to do exactly that), there are thousands of eyeballs that can keep them from doing so!

But, it does still seem to appear that there is some discrepancy in the stories being told about this situation.

Never mind the "stories". Check the demonstrable facts.

On NPR, The Clinton County chairwoman says that the results had already been reported to HQ...

That's right. That's what she said on both NPR and on CNN. Why did the numbers from that one precinct seem to have disappeared? Don't know. Could, in fact, have been a "glitch" where they mistransposed a number, or had a typo and so wanted to get that particular precincts numbers again. In any case, CNN was able to wake her up in middle of night, ask her to walk over and tell them her numbers (before she had the chance to get directions from anybody else) and her numbers matched the ones that both the Romney and Santorum folks both had previously confirmed that they had as well. What did the Paul folks have for that precinct? Don't know. But you (or anybody else) should be able to check with them. It got enough attention that you'd think the Paul supporter from that precinct --- or any of the other folks who were able to watch the count there --- would be screaming bloody murder by now if the well-reported numbers were in conflict with what actually was seen to have gone on at that particular precinct that night.

If the process is...

Votes on paper ballots.
Public tallies called into HQ.
Final "Certified results" from HQ

From kindly old ladies woken in the middle of the night who don't actually understand what may or may not have gone on. "Computer glitch" is an easy way to refer to any problem that happened. If there was such a "glitch" and if that was a suspicious one (they all can be presumed to be so), the good news is we don't have to rely on any one source to know that we've finally gotten it right! Again, thanks to the transparent processes used in Iowa where EVERYBODY WAS WATCHING!

In this video, Jim Condit Jr. warns (IN ADVANCE) that there will probably be, based on his past history with the Iowa GOP and work he did for Pat Buchanan, in 1996, that any "computer glitches" or "final results going super late into the night/morning" should be perceived as "fishy."

Again, doesn't matter what he "warns". What matters is what can be verified. Does he have evidence that a number reported by the GOP is not accurate? (As he did in the Edward True case?) Good! What's the evidence? So far, other than the True case in Appanoose County, I'm aware of no other publicly reported discrepancies.

The old "computer glitch" in the middle of the night is a serious concern in places where a single secret source must be "trusted". That is decidely --- and happily --- not the case in Iowa. Can't say same for NH or anywhere else between now and the end of the year, however

I'm asking, mostly, because my head is going to explode from trying to understand this process and winnow the BS from the realities.

You're doing a great job of winnowing! Keep up the good work! And keep asking questions --- and/or digging to get to the source of any concerns. Anybody can (and will) speculate about anything. Particularly those on the losing side of an election. But only the actually provable stuff, the independently verifiable stuff, actually matters. And it's also why it's so important to have indepedently verifiable stuff! That stuff disappears when you start using secret vote counting computers, unfortunately. (Hello, New Hampshire and beyond!)

Why the hell do we need citizens to take cell phone pictures to verify votes? Is it crazy to think that the GOP might actually bring a freaking camera to each caucus and take a picture of the tallies?

You don't need to do that. If you prefer, you can simply trust in the GOP's cameras. Now why would you want to do that? Why would you want to trust any single source? That's why when "we, the people" can observe our own elections from start to finish, the process is the most "secure" that it can possibly be!

According to you and most of the other "accountability" advocates that I've read, the weapon of choice for "keeping them honest" seems to be documenting the results of caucus type situations.

But, these are the vast minority of voting situations are they not?

Yes, they are.

Aren't the majority of the votes cast in the primary and general elections going to be done on some sort of black box/computer voting machine?

Yes, they are.

What "weapon" is there in these situations?

You have way fewer weapons in such cases. Which is why those system are horrible! See previous 10,000 pages, or so, of reporting over the last eight years here at The BRAD BLOG for more details!

Each state will be different, as far as what folks can do to try to get as much oversight as possible. None of them perfect, given the shitty voting systems they all use. I'll try to post something on what folks can do in NH tomorrow later tonight or tomorrow. Among things they can do: Get cell phone photos of poll tapes at the end of the day at each of the state's precincts. The good news: They hand count (just as they did in IA) in about 40% of the towns in NH. The bad news: Those towns only account for about 10% of the ballots cast statewide. Beyond that, NH's op-scan system is terrible.

But again, more eyes and cell phones the better, sending the message that if you try and cheat, we will try and catch you doing it!

Given your experience, I'm sure you are more familiar with the whole computer/black box voting problem. So, why (if you are) are you optimistic that we can, in any real way, force accountability?

Looks like they got what they wanted, and they were able to pull off the sham of it transparently by delaying the actual results.

So noew we know Santorum won, and by more than just a few votes. But all they needed to do to give Romney the illusion of victory, and invincibility was to hide the real results from the public and alloe the media to run with the story that Mitt was 2-0 in primaries so the Republican sheeple could jump on the annointed's bandwagon.

And in the end, even hand counted ballots, recounted can't stop them from calling this "a tie". Wow, it's just so sad how twisted out election system has become. And beyond the voter suppression the new war is on anyone who has ever been convicted of a felony. Pay for your crimes but have your rights to representation taken away forever.